Planning My After-life (But I'm Not Dying!)

This blog entry has been inspired by the works of ::Caitlin Doughty:: and the Order of the Good Death.

For a long time, probably since I went to my grandmother's funeral as a child, I've thought about how I'd like my own funeral to be. It is probably a total 'Goth cliche', but when other girls planned their ideal wedding, I was thinking less about white carriages bedecked with red roses... and more black horse-drawn hearses bedecked with white lilies. 

I'm not suicidal or dying or anything, and hopefully what I'm writing about won't be useful for a few decades still (my grandmother lived into her '90s, as did several of my more elderly relatives), but I think about these things anyway. 

Some people might find that depressing, but to me it offers the comfort of some level of control over the finality of things - how I'll leave my 'last impressions' on the world, what my legacy will be.  I guess it helps me also accept my own mortality and the finality of death (even if I joke about being an 'undead vampire' a lot!) and perhaps if I share my thoughts on what I would like to happen to me, then it might help clear the stigma about planning for what happens after your own death. Hopefully openly talking about, and blogging about, what I want to happen to me after my death, is a little step towards encouraging death positivity - a healthy acceptance of death and dying as part of the natural way things happen. 

It must be awful for the bereaved to have to try and plan a funeral as well as be in the early stages of grief, so I also want to have that planned out to save those who remain after me the hassle and bother of having to come up with an apt way to do those things, especially as it's probably quite clear to those who know me that I both admire some funeral traditions, and dislike others, and that it might not be clear to them which I'd want, and which I wouldn't without actually leaving some sort of document behind. Funerals can also be very expensive. Funeral plans exist, and there are ways to pre-pay for your funeral in advance, and this is something I really think people should look into. Monuments can also be quite expensive, and as I want something fancy (more about that later), I want to have mine made while I'm still alive, but I suppose it is possible to make other financial arrangements for a monument.

One issue for me is that I am most likely going to be the last of my immediate family. I couldn't have children even if I wanted to (and I don't) and with the rest of my family, I am either rather deliberately estranged, or much older, with the exception of my adopted sister. As such, other than my partner, I don't have much in the way of immediate family to plan things when I die, and that might make for some legal issues, whereby those who know me best might not be my legal next of kin, especially if I outlive my partner and sister. If I have things planned out (and potentially paid for) before my demise, it might make ensuring my wishes are carried out a bit easier. 

What happens to someone after death actually has a LOT of stages and elements, and I've pondered about a good deal of them. 

One thing I've been considering is what of me I'd donate to science. If there's any parts of me that are useful to medicine or science, I won't be using them any more, so I'd quite like to donate them - however, if I get mangled in a car wreck, I might not be much use for spare parts, but I might make an interesting scientific case-study for understanding exactly what happens if you get hit by the intercity coach or something, but that could also be something already well understood and researched, but if I gave my corpse up for research, I might not get buried at all! I also have spiritual thoughts about whether some of energy would linger on in whoever I get donated to, and that it's one way to live on a little after death, but then what if I would accidentally haunt the recipient? I have heard stories about people who, after transplants, started having eerie connections to their donor, and that honestly bothers me (although quite a few people reading this are probably rolling their eyes and thinking I'm being needlessly superstitious!). It's something I've pondered, and it's made me wonder exactly what bits of me I'd be OK with being reused, too. Perhaps the brain is the seat of our self, and to some it is the heart, so would it be better that those things decompose with the rest of me, to acknowledge the finality of me as myself being gone (I believe in reincarnation, but, to me, reincarnation isn't a direct transfer of consciousness), or would it be better to have my brain preserved in a lab somewhere so that something of what made who I am remains (and could be useful in studying eccentrics with neurological disorders!). It's not something I've fully made up my mind on - organ donation, and donation to science are both things I feel are a good idea, but the nuances of it aren't something I've finalised. 

I believe in reincarnation, a I mentioned above, and that our bodies are just temporary vessels for energy that goes through endless cycles of life, death and rebirth, so I don't feel like I need to have specific after death treatment to ensure a specific afterlife, and my beliefs in regards to such things as ghosts is that ghosts are real, and if you become a ghost or not depends on factors like having unfinished business or a particularly traumatic death, so that wouldn't figure into funerary rites for me. I know some other Pagan paths do have these traditions, and include things like burial goods, but I don't believe in a permanent afterlife place where I need to pack stuff to take with me. This leaves my funerary options a lot more open. 

To me, reincarnation is more like 'spiritual recycling', and in line with that, I also think that the natural literal recycling of a corpse into decomposed mush that feeds further organic life is important. This is the one aspect of what happens to me that I feel strongly about. I don't want to be embalmed; embalming fluid is bad for the environment, and I want to decompose properly. Tidied up so I don't look too awful at my funeral is one thing, but preserved is another. I have no need to lie 'in state' like I'm royalty or Lenin, and I don't feel like decomposition ought to be kept at bay, because it's part of the cycle of life - life feeds on the death of other things, that is how nature works, and if bacteria and the creepy-crawlies in the ground eat me, then that's as nature intended, and hopefully I'll fertilise the ground. 

Wanting a natural burial has many aspects - I don't want a plasticised casket full of synthetic fabrics and foam upholstery, I don't want to be embalmed, and I don't want my coffin to be made out of stuff that's heavily plastics-based or would otherwise not rot well - ordinary wood would suffice (wicker or woven coffins are another option, but they don't look traditional enough for me). That's something I'm very certain of. If my coffin needs to be fancy, they can put a pall over it and some nice flowers. I also wonder about how deep a natural burial should be - will it be 6 feet under, or is it more shallow so that the worms and bugs can munch? Do 'natural' cemeteries allow for monuments as well as trees/plants planted as memorials? Etc. etc. 

Another thing for me to consider is where I would like to be buried. Most of my favourite cemeteries have ceased to take new burials (and usually ceased to do so somewhere around 100 years ago), but most modern cemeteries don't have the same ambience as older ones, because tastes in memorials and headstones have changed (glossy stones, gilded letters, and one of three basic forms with some decorative etching seems to be the norm in many parts of the UK now) and many modern cemeteries I have visited are very linear, organised on a neat grid, and without the interspersing of shrubberies, landscaping and paths that some of the older cemeteries, that were organised, but still had a park-like feel (like Tomnahurich Cemetery in Inverness) do. Some of them seem genuinely depressing rather than simply sombre and reverent - rows and rows of very similar headstones with just grass, plastic flowers, and a grid of gravelled paths, which seems very impersonal, even with the personalised messages on the headstones. As much as I love old churches, I wouldn't want to be buried in a church graveyard.

One thing I am pretty certain about is the design of my headstone. I want it to be circular, I want it to be a stone that will weather nicely over time, and I want it to include an Ouroboros symbol - a serpent eating its own tail - as a symbol of the infinite cycle of destruction and recreation. I would also like a pentacle, as a symbol of my faith. I also want it to be Gothic Revival in style. That's pretty specific, so it's something I would like to commission while I'm still alive, partly as it would be quite expensive for those that remain after me and partly so I can make sure it's exactly as I'd like it. I will leave the face blank, so those who survive me can have whatever words they like inscribed on it, but I want the framing ornament to be quite specific. Maybe it will sit atop a pile of stones in a small cairn, maybe it will stand alone, such things as that, I haven't figured out.

When it comes to the funeral, in many ways, funerals are for the bereaved, not for the deceased. I don't want talk of heaven or God in the conventional meanings of those words at my funeral - for a start, my friends are too diverse in their beliefs for that, and it's also not what I believe in. I would like to write a letter of 'last goodbyes' to be read out at my funeral, and I suspect as my partner and I are Pagan, and much of our friendship circle is, that while we have diverse cosmologies and theologies, Paganism is more orthopraxic than orthodoxic - we are more united by practices than beliefs - so there will be certain elements of Paganism there. I don't want to dictate what those survive me do to best deal with my passing. How I want to be buried is important to me, but whatever rite of memorial others chose is for them, not for me.

I know, in my fantasies, that I'd like to be pulled to my resting place in an ornate carriage pulled by black horses, and that everyone would wear black in traditional mourning, and there would be candles and flowers and and that I'd be carried to my grave by my best friends (which wouldn't work out so well in real life when some are just about 5 feet tall, and some are over 6 feet tall!) and that I'd have a very dramatic, very Victorian funeral, just without the Christian liturgy, but that's what I'd like for myself, and I wouldn't be alive to appreciate it, so there'd be no point. Now, riding in a hearse while I'm alive is a different matter! I want my funeral to be for the benefit of those who survive me, not for me.

Zombie-Ness

Today Inverness hosted its first ever 'Zombie-Ness' zombie walk and zombie street game. This was run, it seems, by the city, and was a test-run for adding a zombie-walk to the yearly city summer festivals programme! I love dressing up, monsters and being ghoulish, so had to take part. Several of my friends went too, and I would estimate a couple of hundred people took part.

One of several photos taken by Raven

People seemed to be more amused than scared, and lots of Inverness citizens and visiting tourists alike wanted pictures of us, and with us. Lots of children took part, and quite a few children who weren't taking part and who spotted us thought we were great fun, and I didn't see any children getting scared; I think they understood it was all just fancy-dress. One little boy had a toy gun with a clicker that made a loud "clack" each time he pulled the trigger, so I completely over acted being 'shot' and collapsing in a heap only to lurch up again. The little boy seemed to think this was brilliant and I had to give up falling in heaps because I was going to scuff my knees!

Raven's Zombie selfie... note the "zombeard" and bullet-wound effects

The aim of the street game was to look for people designated as "zombie food" who registered, but were not in costume. People who were "zombie food" were given green wrist-bands and if they encountered a zombie, the zombie had to high-five them and that person was now 'infected' and had to go to the Zombie-Ness head-quarters where a team of theatrical make-up artistis from Eden Court would give them zombie make-up. I came as a zombie, but went to the Zombie-Ness make-up crew for a touch-up because my fake blood was faded, my make-up a bit tired from all the fun, and I also had room on me for more decay, so they fixed up my face with more fake blood and added rot and sores to my arms. Raven came as "zombie food" but got caught by a zombie, so got a zombie make-over, including bullet-wounds to the head - it seems that the usual means of zombie slaying ("aim for the head") does not work on Highland zombies! 

Raven's Photo of me in the cafe on our break from 'zombing'

B., whom I know from my previous job, made a wonderful platter with a plastic 'brain' under a scalp-cap, and was wandering around as a zombie waiter, which was brilliant. He is also a fan of dressing up, especially when it comes to spooky costumes (and always does something utterly amazing for Halloween) so I expected to see him there. My friend Victoria and her friend Lauren both came as zombie brides, and did rather fabulous costumes for those. Another friend came as a zombie school-girl (moaning "homework suuuuuuucks!" in the slurred growl of the undead) and I went as a zombie Goth (despite being more of a punky Goth than deathrocker today, I made plenty of 'deathrocker/deadrocker' and 'undeathrocker' puns. I just had to!) and I saw a zombie 'policeman' and a little boy zombie on a skateboard. 

We had a great day out, both with the street game and zombie walk, and with meeting up with good friends. I look forwards to more zombies next year, hopefully with even more participants! 

There are more photos from today that were taken, but I have not heard back from the other people in them as to whether I can post them on my blog yet. There may well be an edit of this post in the next few days with extra photographs! 

Autumn Road-Trip 3: Rafford Cemetery

Suzy_Bugs suggested visiting Rafford on our road-trip; I think she spent some of her childhood in the area, and was keen to get us to visit this old cemetery. The cemetery itself is in what seems to be an odd location; off two main roads and away from the church. I think this is because the cemetery pre-dates the church, and while there is a small building in the centre which I think was the grave-keeper's cottage, there's no visible sign of where the church used to be. I will cover the new church in my next post. The whole place is quite low, in a bit of a valley, surrounded by wooded hills and a small village. 

Photograph by HouseCat

The photograph above is what I presume was the grave-keeper's cottage. I had a peek in the windows and open door, and it looks like it is now home to things like planters, but was once where someone lived or worked. Either way, it is fairly empty now, mostly home to lots and lots of spiders. It still has its windows, and it still has its roof, so it has managed to remain a little outbuilding quite well. 

Photograph by HouseCat

The photographs to the left, above and below are of a large mausoleum that dwarfs most of the surrounding grave monuments. The mausoleum has no roof, but does have several plaques inside, mostly over grown by ivy and brambles, so  I could not read which family are interred there. At the back I presume there had once been a plaque naming the family and which members were buried there, but that had fallen away. There were still plaques on other walls, though. The walls of the mausoleum are surprisingly thick, and I do wonder if it was initially designed to have a roof, or whether the family who had it built just wanted a sturdy monument. 

It was late afternoon and quite a bright day, so the shadows were quite strong, and everything getting slightly golden as evening approached. I think it was a rather good time for photographing. Some of the photographs I took later on were perhaps a bit too late in the day, but I think I had it just right for here, Rafford Church and the earlier photographs for Pluscarden Abbey (later in the road-trip). I think there is a window of time in the late afternoon, if the weather is suitable, that is really good for architectural photographs, because there's enough shadow to get defined planes and faces of walls and roofs (especially if there is detail and subtle angles) but it's neither dazzlingly bright, nor too dingy. 

Photograph by HouseCat

Suzy_Bugs told me that both this cemetery and the one by the abandoned chapel visited earlier have graves far more recent than the last use of their associated church or chapel because there is some rule or law that says that if a graveyard stops being used for new burials for long enough, that it can be developed over or somesuch. I'm not sure if this is exactly right, but it does pose an interesting question about how long human remains and graveyards should be left untouched in respect to those who are buried there. Personally, I would be in favour of never building over them (especially as it seems in recent years that we expand our cities and towns too much), but sometime land is unknown to be the last resting place of people because it has been disused as a cemetery for centuries or even millennia. There are a lot more factors in this debate than I can fit into a small paragraph, but it is something I'd like to hear my reader's thoughts on. 

Graveyards, Mortality and Snow

Back in early January, I went on one of my lunch-breaks to a Chapel Yard cemetery in Inverness. I had an extended break, and had time to take the bus from work into the city and then have a quiet stroll. When I got back, one of my colleagues was asking where I'd gone on my break, and when I responded with a graveyard, asked me if I was visiting a relative, and then got surprised when I said that I was just there for a quiet stroll, and thought it would be quite morbid. I think this is a fairly standard reaction from most non-Goths, and some Goths too, and visiting graveyards for reasons other than visiting a specific grave or for a funeral seems alien to a lot of non-Goths, and quite normal to a lot of Goths. I had to get back to working, and so didn't have time to explain to my co-worker exactly what I find appealing - I just said that I liked the peace and quiet, and I didn't have time to take a bus out to the park.

Snowy graves at Chapel Yard Cemetery, Inverness. Phone-cam photo by me.

The full answer is a bit more complicated. 

It is mainly because I do indeed find graveyards peaceful and quiet. Unlike public parks, they get very few visitors. Usually, I am the only person there, and I am unlikely to be disturbed, which gives me time to be alone with my thoughts and away from the rest of the living.  I guess the fact that most people find them morbid, if not outright creepy, is one of the reasons that they remain a place of solitude. While I am an outgoing person, extended social interaction does tire me, and I need time alone to recuperate. Visiting a graveyard does not quite guarantee me brief isolation, but it is most usually solitary enough - some are more frequently visited than others, and I've been to a couple with paths straight through them and thus people using them as thoroughfares, but the Chapel Yard cemetery at the end of Academy Street in Inverness is at least not used as a short-cut, even if it is bordered by two busy and converging roads. Actually, considering its situation, it is surprisingly quiet, something which I attribute to the high walls surrounding it and the numerous trees, shrubs and hedges.

More snowy graves, photographed by HouseCat

Graveyards often have quite interesting masonry and sculpture - old mausoleums, grave-stones and markers, old walls, etc. I like these on aesthetic grounds, but they also serve as a reminder to put things in perspective: as Hippocrates said, "Life is short, art is long" - not just that the physical artefacts of human crafts outlive their makers, or that our deeds can outlive us, but that life is short and that learning any skill, or practising any art, or really doing anything well, is time-consuming and it is important to manage your time wisely - and that includes taking a break from things so that when you go back to them you are more productive. Yes, the graves are very much a reminder of human mortality, but rather than depressing me, this inspires me and reminds me to always live life like I will be struck down by lightning or traffic the next day; I try to make the most of things, avoid leaving things unsaid, and do my best to fill each day with experiences and productive activities.

Interior of mausoleum, note extinguished torch
carving on the far wall. Photo by the HouseCat

Death does not depress or frighten me; yes I wish to accomplish certain things before I am gone, but the fact that I will be gone does not upset me, and never really has. I don't believe in an afterlife, and my view on reincarnation is more that my soul will be recycled, and maybe the next thing I am made into will retain little flashes of me-ness, the way recycled paper sometimes has little bits of still-legible text or flashes of colour, but mostly that which makes me the person I am now will cease to be. These things have never scared me; it just seems logical that all things are born, die, and get recycled one way or another, even if its just the physical recycling of decomposition. Maybe this is why I am attracted to the Gothic; death does not terrify me, not even the prospect of my own demise, instead it just seems like another part of life, and therefore I am not put off the macabre, and if anything just as curious about it as I am anything else. Suffering frightens me, but not dying; being dead seems to mostly be awful for those left grieving in the absence of the deceased, and be merely oblivion for the one who has died. As such, reminders of death, such as graveyards and skulls, don't upset or make me miserable.

Details of the graveyard, with interesting carvings.
Photo by The Housecat, collage made in PicMonkey

Graveyards are also often rare green spaces in urban areas; especially those that do not come with much parkland, or come with parkland that is just flat grass for sports with little in the way of trees and shrubs. I often see a wide variety of birds, and sometimes animals - I often spot hedgehogs and squirrels in graveyards. Sitting on a bench and observing, or going for a quiet stroll, is one way I can get in my dose of "nature time" - something I need to keep myself grounded. For places associated with death, they are usually teeming with life.

I go to graveyards to find solitude, peace, perspective and life, and usually I find it in those places, even if they are places of death for others. 

♫ Music Showcase: And Also The Trees ♫

Band Name: And Also The Trees
Genre: Post-Punk, Alternative Rock
Language: English
Active: 1979-Present
Origin: England
Page: ::Official Website::

This post has been so much fun to write, partly because as I've been writing it, checking my facts and suchlike, I've had their music playing constantly as a soundtrack.

I adore And Also The Trees. And Also The Trees are a British band, from the first wave of dark Post-Punk 'Goth' rock in the '80s, but not as well known or as well-played as acts such as Bauhaus, Joy Division, early The Cure, etc. They are comprised currently of Simon Huw Jones (vocals), Justin Jones (guitar), both of whom are original band members from 1979, and Steven Burrows (bass) who replaced original bassist Graham Havas, Ian Jenkins (bass, double bass) who joined in 2004, Paul Hill (drums) who replaced original drummer Nick Havas, and Emer Brizzolara who plays keyboards.

They were founded in the Worcestershire village of Inkberrow (which makes me think of "ink barrow"), and came to prominence after they sent off a home-made demo tape to The Cure, who really liked what he heard. And Also The Trees ended up playing in a support slot to the Cure, and a friendship formed between the bands. Their second demo 'From Under The Hill' was co-produced by Robert Smith and The Cure's producer Mike Hedges and their first two single releases ('Shantell' and 'The Secret Sea') along with their debut proper album, the eponymous And Also The Trees, were produced by The Cure's drummer and keyboard-player Lol Tolhurst.

And Also The Trees were heavily inspired by their rural origins, which is evident in not only their choice of name, but in many of their lyrics, and in how they craft sonic landscapes from their songs. I guess this is one of the reasons I enjoy listening to them so much, I come originally from a rural Oxfordshire village, and my own creativity is always returning back to the woods and fields of that first home. Now that I live in the Highlands of Scotland, it is again the landscapes that inspire me. Their 1986 album "Virus Meadow" is described as "an album of rich, pagan melancholy & disturbing laments" on their website and I think that encapsulates exactly what I like about the album.

They do not describe themselves as 'Goth', although they state their Post-Punk origins, but being so poetic, so dark, and considering their early sound, I think that the term aptly describes their early musical output. (I think this would be an apt moment to remember ::this article:: I wrote).

They've had a long career in dark and brooding music, having been founded in 1979 and still being active today. Their music has explored a variety of styles and influences over that time, some of it a very long way away from 'Goth', and unlike some musicians of their era, they are still actively producing new material, with their latest album 'Hunter, Not The Hunted' being available on CD and on vinyl off their website. They have been fairly consistent in writing songs with decidedly poetic lyric content and something unnerving and melancholic in nature. Personally, I am quite happy that they strayed into a variety of styles, because this variety has allowed them to express more than they could have done had they stuck narrowly to what they sounded like in the '80s.

Some of their songs are certainly very Gothic in lyrics (in the literary meaning of the term), writing about morbid and eerie subjects, such as the lyrics of 'Scythe & Spade'. When I first heard this I thought of 17thC poets, and I wasn't far wrong at all - the lyrics being a direct reference to a quote from the James Shirley poem 'Death The Leveller'

"Sceptre and Crown
Must tumble down,
And in the dust be equal made
With the poor crookèd scythe and spade."

Which in the lyrics of the song forms the basis of each verse, although fabulously elaborated on in a style in keeping with the poem, and "with the poor crooked scythe and spade" forms the last line of each verse. Here we have a rock band, albeit a Post-Punk rock band, building a song around a 17th century poem about death - in Shirley's case about how the victorious warrior and those that die in battle, as well as kings, all die eventually, a response to the English Civil War and in A.A.T.T.'s case, about how the rich and powerful die and decay the same as the humble. It is a 20thC memento mori in song form, and even if not entirely original, definitely poetic. I think that rock musicians mining the rich seams of British poetry, especially from that period, is a fabulous thing to be happening. Punk is often associated with being an anti-culture, a rebellion against all institutions including the canons of "high art" and "high culture", and here is a Post-Punk embracing it and using it as creative fodder.

They also covered Cat Steven's 'Lady D'Arbanville' in a way that, if you didn't know the Cat Steven's original, you would think was taken from some centuries old ballad, that Lady D'Arbanville was not some 20thC actress and model, but a long dead-aristocrat lying in state in some chapel of pointed-arches and candles.  I think it comes from both Simon Huw Jones' lamenting voice and the swirling orchestration being translated by my decidedly dramatic imagination. (An aside: I have soft spot for the Gigliola Cinquetti cover of 'Lady D'Arbanville' - how not-Goth is that?).

Their music draws me in; with each song I feel like I've been brought into some scenario set before me - their music isn't always necessarily strictly descriptive or narrative, but when it is I really feel like I am there, for example 'Pale Sun' makes me think of claustrophobic fog over a small rural British town, sometime decades, maybe centuries ago. I can see all the lyric details in my minds eye, when they talk of geese and weathervanes. And it's not just the lyrics and the title, it's the music itself. It is murky, everything sounds slightly muffled, petering out into obscurity at the end like a fading dream or an image receding into fog.

Fashion/aesthetic wise, there's a few rather striking black and white pictures of them in Victorian-esque garb looking brooding in front terribly ornate columns and arches (a youtube commenter said "They look like vampires" and I have to agree), and some far more recent pictures of them wearing black suits, black shirts and black ties. They tend to be associated with eerie black and white landscape photographs, which is rather fitting.

I could write several pages about them, and probably already have (maybe I should copy and paste this lot into word and see how many sheets of A4 I'd have taken up if this was in hard-copy rather than on a blog?) but really, the only way to get to know a band is to listen to the music. My favourite album is The Rag and Bone Man, identifiable by its high contrast picture of a ruined cottage (a ruined building, in black and white, set in an ominous landscape, cloudy sky, right up my street in terms of photography) . Here is a suggested playlist, in which I've tried to have a bit of variety. 


Suggested Playlists
❧ "So This Is Silence" from 'And Also The Trees'
❧ "Midnight Garden" from 'And Also The Trees' 
❧ "Virus Meadow" from 'Virus Meadow'
❧ "Maps In Her Wrists and Arms" from "Virus Meadow"
❧ "Scythe and Spade" from 'Farewell To The Shade'
❧ "Misfortune" from 'Farewell To The Shade' (slightly more upbeat). 
❧ "The Pear Tree" from 'The Pear Tree' (I like the Robert Smith remix version)
❧ "The Way The Land Lies" from 'The Rag and Bone Man'
❧ "Domed" from 'The Rag and Bone Man' 
❧ "The Beautiful Silence" from 'The Rag and Bone Man'

Dead Flowers, Decay and Beauty

While being Goth is about primarily music and then fashion, being Gothic is about seeing beauty in death, decay, the transience of life and the fragility of our existences. Dying flowers typify this, once bright, colourful and beautiful, time drains the of their colours, dries out their vibrant petals and turns them into brittle, fragile things that fall apart at even a gentle touch and crumble to dust, but while dried and dead are still beautiful, and even more beautiful for their fragility. As such, I took a few photographs. I tend to keep bouquets that I am gifted until they dry out, and then keep them on display as dead, dried flowers because to me they are still beautiful.

Held up against the sun in a cloudy sky, the structure of the twisted petals becomes clear and the translucence visible. This flower has naturally faded to grey, with only vein-like tracery left in a bloody, rusty red. 

All of these have been held against a matt green background (some card) and photographed such. I wanted to show how papery this flowers had become. I love how the very tips of the petals had remained dark, like they had been carefully dipped. 

This is the same as the last of the black and white photographs. I tried to find a background in a similar colour to the green of the dried stems. I think the subtle variation in colour makes this work better as an image than those in black and white, but that the black and white versions suit the aesthetics of my blog better. 

Mausoleums, Cemeteries and Sundials

I did not want to spam everyone with too many pictures at once yesterday, so today I am posting some of the pictures of other areas of Inverness, notably the cemetery at the end of Academy Street and pictures from Falcon Square.

A broken urn

These pictures are of a broken urn in the Cemetery at the far end Academy Street. It is not the sort of hollow urn for ashes, just a decorative one from atop a monument. I found something distinctly beautiful yet terribly tragic about this ornament. It is from above a grave marker, has broken and then been put upon the edge of this wall. I love all the textures and colours, the dark green especially, and the yellow-green of the moss. When I go to graveyards and cemeteries, I do not take photographs of actual headstones and markers, as feel it is disrespectful to the memory those interred and their families to use something so important for aesthetic entertainment. Architecture and statuary are not so personal, so I am more comfortable photographing those things. 

Sculptors' Mark on Headstone

This is an exception to my policy of not photographing grave-markers. The actual text on this grave had been obliterated by time and weather, but the sculptor's mark remained. It is also the first time I've actually spotted a sculptor's mark on a headstone. 

Skulls with Bat-Wings, Bones and Ravens

I saw this part of a mausoleum and thought it was fascinating. One difference I have seen between Scottish and English graveyards is that in Scotland there are far more open references to death - I see a lot of skulls, inverted chalices, bones etc. In England I saw more angels and Madonnas, more floral designs and more poetry. I'd never seen a skull design in a graveyard before I moved up here. The graveyard in Academy Street is full of such designs, and it does make the place a bit eerie. 

I do not just take photographs of cemeteries and churches, and there is actually quite a bit of interest in the city, as there are in most British towns and cities (and most mainland European ones too). One of the wonderful things about Scotland is that history surrounds you and virtually everything has a story. Even the modern things are often beautiful, and I see a lot of pubic statues and monuments. 

Sundial at Falcon Square

In Falcon Square, which is the main square outside the Eastgate Shopping Centre (the mall, to Americans) is a statue of a unicorn rearing on a pedestal, birds swooping round it. At the base of the pedestal there are four sun dials, one each face of the pedestal. Here are photographs of parts of two of them. A lot of people, including those who live in the city, forget that these sundials are here, or ignore them. There are people who regularly sit on the pedestal steps and have still not noticed the sundials. Personally, this is very peculiar - there are four metal dishes, quite large, inserted into the side of a very large pedestal; this should be obvious. The bronze has gained a beautiful patina, with hints of green and gold. The sundials are relatively recent, so the casting is still crisp. Personally, I find the sundials one of the more attractive features of the square. It's much nicer to look at than the bus-stops and gaggles of teenagers and shoppers, anyway. 

30 Day Goth Challenge, Day 4

I'm usually mostly out and about after dark. That is partly because I've moved North, and the days here at least feel considerably shorter than they were, but I think that this is partly because I am ringed by mountains, so the sun has set behind the mountains long before it would set behind a flat horizon. This is also because my partner works until quite late, he often finishes work at gone 19:00 and then has a 45 minute commute home, so if we want to do anything together, including mundane shared chores like food shopping, it is usually done after 20:00. I am up and awake long before then, and do get up at a sensible time, but with the weather having turned for the worse, there's less conservation work for me to do, and I am less inclined than usual to walk into town, especially as I know I'll be walking home alone in the dark if I do that. Also, if it gets dark before 16:00 and light after 09:00, there's not that much of the day when itisn'tdark here in Winter :P I'm also a sucker for not going to bed until I've done a task - for example last night I stayed up working on a Doodle or Die drawing of a Samurai, in great detail, until it crashed at 03:30. If I start something, unless something really distracting happens, I'm usually locked off from the world until I've completed it.

Pale As Death

I'm naturally rather pale, though pale with a reddish tinge, and I tend to do my makeup not to make me actively paler, as I'm pale enough anyway, even for the Gothic look, but simply to make my skin less pink. I am often asked if I'm feeling ill, or what the matter with me is, but the truth is I'm fine, this is my natural, normal skin-tone. I've also got poor circulation, so my hands and feet are often very cold. As you can imagine, this means I end up the butt of corpse-jokes, but that's fine by me. I've found a lot of Goths are naturally pale people, maybe it's because Goth provides a style alternative for people who are never going to pull off the sun-kissed blonde look but can do pale and interesting quite well.

All Black Everything

Black is not my favourite colour, but it is one of them. I do tend to pick the black option even when buying items with little inherent Goth potential, not just because I don't want my cleaning stuff to clash with my clothes, but simply because I like the colour black. My four favourite colours are purple, green, black and blue - in that order. This said, I have, and this list is not exhaustive, the following: black coat-hangers, black-handled cutlery (and that actually IS deliberately Goth), black serviettes, black bedding (also Goth), a black "Gothmas" tree, square black crockery, a black electric-guitar-shaped grater, black towels, black coffee mugs, black tissue-box, black sushi plates, black plastic cooking utensils, black-handled scissors, black photo-frames (also fairly Goth) etc. etc. My wardrobe is a black-lined pit of black clothes and black shoes. Sometimes I wear a bit of green, blue, or purple, but it's mostly black on black. I get teased by friends who, when I buy something totally not goth-related and it turns out to be black, say "Oh! What a surprise! It's pink! Wait, no, it's black." Even my socks are at least mostly black.

Skulls Are Beautiful

I collect animal skulls, collect skull-shaped items, wear skull jewellery, and generally love skulls. I even paint and draw them. I also like Reapers, and bones, and other stereotypically skeletal things. I want to get a biology model skeleton to hang on my wall because I think they're aesthetically pleasing as well as educational. All my animal skulls are found pre-deceased (and mostly picked clean) on walks. I do boil them thoroughly and wash them thoroughly before displaying them. I like deer skulls the best, but have the skulls of other wildlife. I want a raven skull. My favourite art pieces are Memento Mori and Vanitas paintings.

Caught In An Explosion In A Lace Factory

I think this is as much a Lolita/Aristo stereotype as it is a Gothic one, but it's often true for me. I'll wear shirts with triple-lace cuffs, a lace trimmed skirt over petticoats, a lace jabot, lace head-gear and lace as cuff-bracelets and then tie another bit of lace in a loop under my collar and over my jabot, probably in contrasting black, and then carry a lace parasol. Trim my lace with more lace! Lace is a favourite material of mine, I love its intricacy and delicacy and the beautiful patterns it is made in. If I liked pastels and suited them, I'd probably be a Sweet Lolita cliche. I always feel very elegant when I'm wearing lots of lace.

Breathing Is Unimportant!

I lace my corsets tight and wear them pretty much constantly. I'll wear leather studded corsets with buckles, and I'll wear fancy brocade corsets over lacy tops. I like underbust, I like overbust, I like anything as long as it is mostly black, has proper steel boning and pulls me right in like an hour glass. I like white and ivory corsets to wear under period-inspired clothes, I like fancy PVC outerwear corsets to wear as a futuristic cyber-goth. I really, really, really, like corsets. In fact, I think I'm in love with them. They make me look skinnier, bustier and better proportioned. They're warm in winter. They're sexy. They're classy. They're everything I could wish for in one garment.

Bleak-eyed Writer

I wrote my fair share of angst-ridden poetry and bleak, dark fantasy fiction as a teen. Now I'm writing an apocalyptic novel set in a world where civilisation has collapsed and humanity is tearing itself apart, the environment is ruined and a lot of people die. I guess it's gone from Gothic to Rivethead literature, but hey, it doesn't depress me to write it. That said, I'm writing this novel as a warning, not an instruction manual for annihilation nor as a morbid adrenaline-junky's holiday brochure. I also like black humour, and write things that are funny-yet-morbid. I still write poetry, though it is more in the vein of admiring the beauty (and dark beauty) of the universe than in complaining about how awful my life is in poorly-written verse. My poetry abilities have also improved since I was a teen, mostly because writing poetry is one of those things I do quite frequently, for example when bored, on trains, while waiting for public transport, on long journeys, or anywhere else I get 5 or more minutes of sitting-down time. I have also learnt that angsty ramblings are not good subject matter and that good poetry requires more than just rhyme and raiding the thesaurus.

These are the main ones, but I also love ravens, magpies, crows and other corvids, do Siouxsie Sioux style eye makeup or draw curlicues, tend to go out everywhere pretty darn goth, read lots of vampire stories and hang around in graveyards. Yep, I'm a cliche, but I'm having fun being a cliche, so I don't care.